Often I am asked what is Google PR? Well in Google terms it does not refer to Press Release. Instead it refers to Page Rank. Page Rank is an algorithm that was developed by Larry Page as a method of determining the importance of a webpage.
Essentially, Page Rank treats each link to a website like a vote. Each link equals a vote on how popular a site is. Google is using the theory that more links to a website means that the website is a better website. However, people soon began gaming the system. Over the years Google has developed a more sophisticated system of weeding out link farms and methods that people may use to artificially create a higher Page Rank.
This is just one of many methods Google uses to determine your search rankings, but it is not the sole component. Many in the SEO’s in the industry stay fixated on page ranking. They are fixated on getting links to your website from high ranking PR sites. While some of that Page Rank may be transferred to your site, you also need to consider the anchor text and the type of site that is linking to you. The relevancy of the words linking to you have a huge impact.
So how can you find out your site’s Page Rank. That is simple. Download the google page rank toolbar here.
The next question I often get is how often is this updated. Well, the main way we see updates is through the Google Page Rank toolbar. At one point Google was updating this about every 3 to 4 months. This has fallen back a bit in recent times and below is a video from the head of Google’s Search Engine team to explain why:
The previous Page Rank Updates are:
- 6 December 2013
- 4 February 2013
- 7 November 2012
- 2 August 2012
- 2 May 2012
- 7 February 2012
- 7 November 2011
- 1st Week August 2011
- JULY 2011
- JUNE 2011
- JANUARY 2011
- April 2010
- Dec 31, 2009
- 30 October 2009
- 27/28 May 2009
- June 2009
- 1 / 2 April 2009
- 30-31 December 2008
- 27 September 2008
- 26 July 2008
- 29 April 2008
- 9 January 2008
- 26 October 2007
- 28 April 2007
To find out more information on Page Rank check out the SEJ article on Page Rank.
